Swenn-Larsson joins the list of podium winners

March 8th, 2014

Anna Swenn-Larsson scored the first podium of her World Cup career as she placed third in the last regular season World Cup slalom of the season. This was the HEAD World Cup Rebel’s eighth top ten result in the World Cup but the first time she had been on the podium. Mikaela Shiffrin won the race and with it the Globe and Maria Pietilae-Holmner took second.

This was a race of lots of variables: Many of the racers had to contend with fog on the second run yet this cleared up for the final racers. Swenn-Larsson was fifth after the first run, just ahead of Maria Hoefl-Riesch, and the Swede used her head to attack knowing that if she put pressure on the later runners, there was a possible great result for her. There are small margins in slalom and in making the fastest second run time when she went down, Swenn-Larsson put the pressure on.

After the race, Swenn-Larsson was overcome with joy: “I do not know what to say, it's crazy. Yes. Yes. Yes ... It's so damn fun. Yes, my God. I'm speechless.” Swenn Larsson then added: “There is so much emotion. I just thought at the start that I would run for the medals. I did everything I could and then I stand here now, it's amazing, says Swenn-Larsson.

There was more emotion for Swenn-Larsson as she explained her family had been at the race: “It was great fun to get to perform when my family is here. They've gone down to Austria three times and I have skied out of all the races so it feels good that it's fine when it's there on the spot.”

Having lost the lead in the Overall World Cup to fellow HEAD World Cup Rebel, Anna Fenninger, Maria Hoefl-Riesch did exactly what she needed to do: score a result. This was when all Hoefl-Riesch’s experience came into play as she skied conservatively to place seventh and reclaim the lead in the Overall by 29 points with just four races left of the season: one per discipline.